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It’s a heck of a way to run a pre-election campaign. On the eve of an expected election, politicians usually spend their time playing up good news, downplaying the bad, shaking hands and kissing babies.

The annual Perseid meteor shower hits Canadian skies this weekend, but another supermoon may dull its shooting stars. Astronomer Paul Mortfield explains how to make the best of it.

A shot of the Perseid meteor shower in 2013.

Photograph by: AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris
, Canada.com

It’s a good weekend for stargazers.

Not only will the second supermoon in as many months light up Canadian skies, but the Perseid meteor shower will again grace us with its own show. The Perseid shower will peak between Sunday and Wednesday of next week, but if you’re out of the city this weekend you may glimpse a few overnight Friday and Saturday.

But there’s a catch: the bright moon will make it harder to see the smaller meteors. Larger meteors will shine through, said astronomer Paul Mortfield, chair of the David Dunlap Observatory and former NASA and Sandford University researcher. Below he explains how to make the most of the muted show and explains the science behind falling stars.

How much will the so-called supermoon affect our ability to see the Perseid meteor shower?

“Any time there’s a moon up in the sky what it does is reduces the amount of meteors we can actually see because it’s like having a big light on at the same time. So you’ll see some of the bright ones but you won’t see a lot of the faint ones.”

What’s the best time of night to try and catch a glimpse?

“The best time to see a meteor shower is after midnight and the best thing to do is go find a local park or a backyard or somewhere where you don’t have direct light on you and then you’ll be able to see the meteors.”

Is there a specific space in the sky people should be watching?

“That’s the great thing about watching meteors you never know where they’re coming from. If you draw a line backwards from when you see the meteor trail across the sky they’ll be coming out of the northeast but meteors will appear anywhere in the sky.”

How big are these meteors?

“The actual average size of a meteor is smaller than your baby fingernail; whereas the bigger ones will obviously be brighter as they burn up in our atmosphere but most of them are really tiny specks of dust.”

How fast are they travelling?

“When we see meteors enter our atmosphere they’re usually travelling anywhere between sixty and hundred thousand kilometres an hour.”

What is that sparkling tail on larger meteors made of?

“The trail behind the meteor is [created] as the particles are burning up in our atmosphere. The bigger ones take longer and you’ll sometimes see little bits breaking off behind it?”

Are any of the meteors dangerous?

“Usually there is no danger of anything really big coming down … they’re all coming off the tail of a comet so most of them are going to be really really tiny. The comet that causes the Perseid meteor shower is call Comet Swift-Tuttle (named for the scientists who discovered it).”

So what exactly causes this fantastic display?

“The comet Swift-Tuttle, when it came by, left a set of debris behind it from its tail and every year the earth comes around and passes through that debris field and keeps hitting more and more of it. And that’s what causes the meteor shower.”

When will we next see the comet itself?

The year 2126.

“The comet last came around in 1993. It’s a periodic comet that comes around once every 133 years, so right now we don’t see the comet but we see what it left behind.”

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